SIGNY SPECIAL EDITIONAfter leaving Bird Island we headed south to the South Orkney Islands
to open up Signy Research Station for the summer. As expected we encountered the
ice about 50 miles from the South Orkney Islands, and, after a couple of days of bashing
our way through, we arrived to some wonderful weather and spectacular sunsets
lighting up the peaks along Coronation Island.

Sunset over Coronation Island, South Orkney Islands.

Over the last four weeks we have had the pleasure of Dick Laws, formerly
Director of BAS, aboard RRS James Clark Ross. He spent 25 months in
1948-50 as Base Leader on Signy, studying elephant seals, and is not surprisingly
a mine of information on all things to do with BAS and more especially
to do with Signy! He has very kindly provided the following account on
Signy.

SIGNY ISLAND By Dick LawsSigny is one of the South Orkney Islands, just south of 60 degrees South.
Another larger island, Coronation Island, is a superb mountain wall rising
from the sea to over 4000 ft and dominating the view to the north. The
islands were discovered and charted in 1821 by the American sealers, Powell
and Palmer, in search of fur seals, which were duly exterminated. They are
only now making a come-back.

Signy itself resembles an isosceles triangle with a three mile base and an
apex about 4 miles distant. An ice cap covers much of the interior, reaching
the sea along the south coast and as the tiny Orwell Glacier near
the station on the east coast. The BAS station stands on the shore of a small
cove, Factory Cove. In 1911/12 to 1914/15 and 1919/20 to 1929/30 Norwegian
whaling companies operated there during the summer months, catching
thousands of whales, mostly Blue and Fin for their oil. Little trace of
the shore factory built in 1920/21 now remains, other than the wooden flensing
deck where the whales were cut up. Signy Island is named after Fru Signe
Sorlle, the wife of a Manager of the station. In 1947 a FIDS
base was built on Berntsen Point above the whaling station, of which virtually
nothing now remains.

I, with two, later three companions lived in a hut measuring 24 x 14
ft, with a wartime Nissen hut for storage, sheds for the generator and meteorological
balloon filling, and a two seater loo with a view.The hut was enlarged,
using materials from the old whaling station. Apart from varied scientific
work on Signy, winter man-hauling sledge journeys for mapping and geology were made along the coast
of Coronation Island. The equipment and supplies
were primitive, but we had a very enjoyable time.

The hut was further enlarged in 1950 and in 1957 the base moved to its
current position, as a large wooden building - Tonsberg House - which still
stands. Over the years additional buildings were erected including a large
two-storey plastic building with living and laboratory accommodation (still
there) . Other laboratories and facilities were needed as the scientific
programmes developed: more laboratories, diving facilities and recompression
chamber, general store and a jetty, slipway, boathouse and workshop. Some
of these have been taken down.

The island has been one of the most productive of Antarctic bases, starting
with my in-depth study of elephant seal biology, which led to the reversal
of the decline of the South Georgia elephant seal population and putting the
sealing industry on a sustained yield basis. A strong long-term marine
biology programme was developed, and, in 1971, BAS biologists demonstrated
that they could successfully extend their work offshore, using a cargo
ship, RRS John Biscoe as a platform. After further trials and modifications,
funds were found to convert and equip the ship as a well-found marine science
vessel. It was used for physical oceanography, marine geophysics and marine biology
including krill and fish. So Signy Island is historically important as
the place where BAS offshore marine work began, leading to the present
day multi-disciplinary marine science programmes for which RRS James Clark
Ross was specifically designed.

Adeile penguins on the run

Crabeater Seals

Other science over the years has included meteorology, mapping and geological
mapping, (involving extensive dog-sledging from Signy), glaciology, terrestrial
botany, and freshwater biology of the sixteen lakes on the island. Long term monitoring
programmes were maintained to provide a baseline to which more detailed
experimental studies could be related. Signy Island is also a naturalists'
paradise, with large penguin colonies (Chinstrap, Adelie, Gentoo and Macaroni)
located about the three points of its triangle. Many petrel species nest,
and bird banding, started in 1948, established the circumpolar movements at sea
of giant petrels, the longevity and life histories of smaller petrels,
such as snow petrels, cape petrels, prions and storm petrels. Colonies of
blue-eyed shags have also been studied over the years, as well as terns
and skuas. Hundreds of Weddell seals breed in the spring on the sea ice
around the island. Crabeater seals are abundant in the surrounding pack
ice - and we saw two pups on our way in. The sinister leopard seals prey
on penguins and other seals. Large numbers of elephant seals and fur seals
haul out to moult in the summer and there is a small breeding colony of
elephant seals - on this visit we saw only five females and pups, compared
with about 100 in 1948-49. Conversely there has been an enormous summer
build up of fur seal numbers (from one recorded in 1949 to twenty thosand in recent
years), but on this visit we are too early to see this. They are mainly subadult males,
but a few pups are born annually. This reflects the huge increase, under
complete protection, of the South Georgia fur seal population. Minke and
killer whales come inshore occasionally.

In contrast to South Georgia, the land vegetation is mainly mosses and
lichens, plus two species of flowering plants, which don't set seed every
summer; land animals are restricted to small invertebrates. The lakes cover
a range of conditions, with some always ice-covered, others with little
or no life in their waters, some highly enriched by the faeces of birds
and seals. This abundant and varied natural fauna and flora provides abundant
opportunities for research on many fundamental biological and physiological
problems, that can be more easily studied in the simpler Antarctic ecosystems.

Signy Station

Sevvy Afanasyev and his camera

In 1995 the base was rebuilt as an excellent "summer only" facility,
with accommodation for up to eight scientists and support staff.
It has to be opened up each season, starting up the generators for light,
heat and power, installing a sea water pump to provide for making fresh
water by a "reversed osmosis" process, taking down the shutters from the
windows, digging out the snow drifts, and of course resupplying the base
from the ship. We have left seven of our colleagues there with Martin Davey
as Base Commander.

From 1995 the science has contracted as the focus of BAS biology
shifted to Rothera Station. The past achievements are now represented by
on-going long-term studies on penguin foraging, and diving behaviour and
physiology (by Amanda Lynnes), montoring of the lake environments (by Rod
Strachan), seal and bird counts as well as other work. Veseolod Afanasyev
inspected his automatic, solar powered camera equipment set up to monitor
the sea ice extent, which has now been running without trouble for five
years.

Long may all this continue.

The station relief was much easier at Signy than at Bird Island
with only about ten tons of cargo needing to be moved. However it isn't
until the ship actually arrives near the station that we know whether we're
dealing with open water or sea ice. This year we were greeted by sea ice,
which, after initial testing by the "Signy ice specialists", was found to
be safe and the relief could be done simply by unloading the cargo by crane
directly from ship onto the ice and then towing it on sledges by skidoo
to the station. Everything went very smoothly and was completed by the
end of the first day.

Amanda and Mark with a light load!

JCR unloading onto the Sea ice

Due to such a successful relief and the fact that the Signy team managed
to get everything up and running without a hitch after the long dormant
winter (generator, comms, water supply etc.), most people got the opportunity
to get out and about. Some, or should I say one, had obviously spent some
time dressing for the occaision - Doug otherwise known as "Sherpa Trevett"
pictured below kitted out including rations in his pack for his 1 hour
stroll! Apparently it's best not to get caught short.

Since opening up Signy for the summer we've headed back towards the Falkland
Islands, leaving the ice behind us, and embarked on another science programme.
As usual this has led us right back into stormy seas and I note that Mark
Belchier, in charge of the science, is keeping a low profile - either not
wanting to take the blame for yet more bad weather, or just working extremely
hard!

SCIENCE by Mark BelchierOver the last 48 hours we have used the passage to Stanley to undertake a survey of larval squid abundance over the
shelf break area of Burdwood Bank to the south of the Falkland Islands.
A bongo net, a type of fine-meshed net frequently used to sample smaller
zooplankton, was deployed at locations along the shelf edge of Burdwood
Bank.

Bongo nets being deployed

Squid larvae

Larval squid were sorted from the catch and preserved for examination
back in Cambridge. It is hoped that the current survey will help improve
our knowledge of the early life histories of the large number of squid
species which occur in the region.